Bridging the Cultural Divide: The role of the home‐school support worker

Abstract

A three-year Home Office funded project placed social work trained homeschool support workers on the staff of secondary schools with the aim of reducing school exclusions. Data from the project evaluation enabled an analysis of the possibilities and limitations of social work in school settings. A qualitative evaluation methodology was adopted with extended periods of fieldwork in the seven project schools and the use of a variety of qualitative and quantitative data collection techniques. It is argued that, if schools are to be successful sites for social work, the tensions arising from the different cultures of teachers and social workers must be recognised and addressed. A number of factors were found to be crucial for assisting social work trained support workers to become accepted in schools. The support worker role resulted in a variety of benefits for teachers, thus enabling the project to act as a bridge between social work and educational cultures.

‘Youth is Present Only When Its Presence is a Problem’: Voices of Young People on Discipline in School

“…There is a long‐established and valuable international literature, which examines discipline, indiscipline, behaviour and behaviour management in school (see for example, Department for Education and Science, ; Hayden, ; McCluskey, , ; Munn and others, ; Skiba and others, ; Stafford and others, ; Webb and Vulliamy, ) and differential experiences of school related to gender, ethnicity and social class (Archer and Yamashita, ; Cruddas and Haddock, ; Gaine, ; Jackson and others, ; Lloyd, ; Macdonald and Marsh, ; Mills, ; Ridge, ). A body of research exists on non‐attendance and exclusion from school and young people's experience of exclusion (Daniels and others, ; Munn and others, ; Osler and others, ; Parsons, ; Pomeroy, ).…”

Supporting the Vulnerable Child: Engaging Fathers in the Home–School Dimension of Pastoral Care

“…The broad landscape of parental involvement in schools is served by a diverse and deep literature (West, Noden, Edge and Miriam, 1998) -with specific resources on achievement (Driessen, Smit and Sleegers, 2005), homework (Farrow, Tymms and Henderson, 1999;Solomon, Warin and Lewis, 2002) and literacy (Marsh, 2003). The role of the home-school support worker is explored by Webb and Vulliamy (2003); Hancock (1998) examines institutional and practical challenges of bringing home-school liaison into the classroom, while Francis and Archer (2005) consider the differences and similarities between British-Chinese pupils' and their parents' views on the value of education. Socio-economic class, race/ ethnicity and gender are acknowledged as important factors in explaining differences in parental involvement (McNamara, Hustler, Stronach, Rodrigo, Beresford and Botcherby, 2000).…”

Breaking the Cycle of Educational Alienation: A Multi-Professional Approach- by Richard Williams and Colin Pritchard

“…Beginning and newly qualified teachers will find Chapter 12 ‘Practical developments for mainstream schools’ particularly helpful. Richard Williams does not duck the problem of differing orientations between social workers and teachers that concerned Webb and Vulliamy (2003), noting that ‘home‐school support workers need to have a strong sympathy with primary educational objectives so that their social work type of intervention facilitates the school's primary educational role’ (p. 37).…”